What is KyoKushin Exactly?

I ask this because I have seen some vid's on this site and these guys seem to be Tradititional Japanese and Damn they got some great kicks!!! Anyone here a Kyokushin practitioner? Looks like they can scrap. Please Drop in on this thread and tell me a bit. It looks like a very cool traditional system.

One other thing on a side note to every one whom frequent's this site...I would just like to say how happy I am to find a no BS site on which different martial artists' can come together and agree to disagree. Plus the no cupcake factor is great...you people rock...NO HOMO!!! :icon_chee

Yeah - the 3 weaknesses of KK - slowly getting worse:
1: No head punches in Knockdown rules (we do train them people, and we do use gloves and fight MT style too, but KNockdown rules don't allow hand techs above the collar bones).
2: Banning of grappling in Knockdwon
3: Used to have lots of open style challenges and tournaments and go figth lots of other styles (KK vs MT in 50s, 60s and 70s were won by KK) but no more.

There are reasons behind all of these, but I think they need rethingking - Matsui is totally absorbed with tradition, whereas Oyama was all about evolution.
No head shots - were allowed until the late 70s (so were groin kicks) but while the Japanese showed restraint, westerners didn't and it made it very hard for the style to grow in the west when new students came home with teeth through there lips and swollen nuts. They didn't want to go to gloved sparring, since gloves change the whole mechanics of stiking (see bareknuckle boxing - straight puches and mainly to the body - vs MOQ rules) and in the interests of not being sued and being abel to retain students decided to ban headshots in KD rules. Too many fighters concentrated on KD rules to the detriment of their street defence, but then most of the KK instructors I have trained with had been bouncers, and had foinght in kickboxing too (one 5th Dan in NZ KO'd his opponent with the first punsh in hsi forst KB match, and since the guy was bleeding from the eyes and ears decided he didn't want to KB anymore).
Don't knock body shots - like i said before (and you can confirm with a net search) bareknuckle boxers didn't work the head much, since heads break hands a hell of a lot, and they found knock outs by striking the body were easier and mroe effective. When I was bouncing and it was at a club which would let us hit, we weren't allowd to hit the face/head. I've seen a hell of a lot of guys get taken down when they work the head and their opponent works the body - gloved sparring won't help this, but try it with MMA gloves on the head striker (if you are too soft to go bare handed) and bareknuckle on the body puncher and see what happens - once you get your head around it you might be surprised at the reults. Of course you still need to be able to defend the head, and thats where a lot of the KK fighters are weak, since if tehy focus on KD rules, they won't be used to slipping or blocking head punches.

Grappling - We still train some limted groundwork here, and do a fiar bit of clinch and stand up grapling that can be applied to the ground. The style didn't teach anything more because when it started Judo was part of teh Japanese high school syllabus and all the exponenets knew grappling. Early sparring the the Kaikan often went to teh gorund and continued there. The pahsing out of the grabbin in sparring was a result of Judo not being taught at schools, and the Japanese competitors ebing disadvantaged in terms of size when clinching was allowed. In order to keep Japan at the top of the KK rankings (an Oyama prerogative) it was removed from tournaments. When I was training for the KD tournmanet I did we didn't know until the last minute whether we would be allowed no grabbing or 1 second grabs.

Tournaments becoming closed - This is a result of Oyama losing control of the organisation before his death, and the continued dominance of the traditionalists who will not risk KK losing its reputaion. Thing is what they are doing is costing it its reputation. The style used to pride itself on being able to take on all comers. They need to do this again, and Shidokan seems to be following teh correct path. A style thats stops evolving starts to die. A lot of KK instructors are leaving the style as tehy are either told not to compete in Kickboxing events, or not to train fighters for them, or are just dissatisfied with the blindness at the top of the style. If Matsui doesn't learn form Oyamas mistakes (that drove some of his best exponents away - Steve Arneill, Tadashi Nakamura, Shigeru Oyama, Kenji Kurosaki and Kenji Fijihara plus a slew of more recent guys) he will be the head of an organisation that exisits in name only - they are literally telling figheers not to compete outside KK because losing will result in a loss of face for the style, and in most cases people who continue to fight outside KK are bieng expelled unless they have the status guys like Filho have.

KK needs a revamp to bring it back to where it was in the 60s thru the early 80s, as a style that produced strikers equal to MT. It also needs to start training groundwork. Simple as that, no correspondance to be entered into. No ground game, limited clinch work and not being used to working with differnt rules sets = bad.

I can't believe I'd never even heard of kyokushin before I came to this board. Tells you something about the closed door policy, eh?

That and there aren't very many karate schools in Austin. UT has a Shotokan group and I think there's a kobudo guy somewhere in North Austin, but I can't remember which ryu of karate he claims to teach.

And I got kicked in the nose

Iíve never actually understood why people say that the "no-head-punch" rule in Kyokushin is a weakness. Iíve never seen UFC see guys or Muay-Thai fight bare fisted. Why Itís simply too dangerous to all the fighters. But that doesnít make men like Shamrock weak? Of course it doesnít.

Quite frankly there were 2 reasons why there was that rule change. First: The serious head trauma that can be found in fighters after years of competition is one real reason. Case in point .Muhammad Ali.
Second: Many students were dropping out of Karate because of it.
Because who wants to go school or work the next day with black-eyes and still bleeding lips or broken teeth.

It was more of a political and probably an image decision that did not hinder the philosophical teachings of kyokushin.The rule change really didn't take anything away from what was being thought by senseis. And that was finding the determination and strong spirit to win and win. No matter what the setting.

No one then and know were forced to compete. There had been a one tournament rule for every person preparing for there black Belt test. But no one had to become a career fighter in Kyokushin.

While many of the Japanese/Okinawan Karate styles allowed head shots in the 50í, 60" and 70".But we still are allowed to kick to the face/(head).I have to say that Kyokushin is still the toughest Karate style out there. Bare none.

I don't see many pratitioners of other styles fighting the way we do. Heck! I got a bruised rib and a sore chest from this weeks fight night. And I got kicked in the nose for all my trouble. What do you guys have?

If there is anyone interested. There is an update of the recent Womenís and Menís world tournament in Japan at this Website. Please check it out! Yes itís in Polish. But donít worry you just have to look at the pictures to understand.

The official dogi (karate uniform) used by a kyokushin practitioner has the word 'kyokushinkai' embroidered on the left side of the dogi-jacket, this calligraphy is called ďkanjiĒ . The internationally recognized symbol of kyokushin karate, the 'kanku' originates from the kata Kanku Dai. In this form, the hands are raised to the sky with the fingers touching. The logo interprets the fingers as the points implying the peaks, representing the wrists as the wide sections, signifying power. The center represents infinity and the circle that encloses the parts, continuity and circular motion. It is the utilization of this circular movement in the execution of techniques that distinguishes kyokushinkai karate from the traditional styles of karate that rely on simple linear movement.

Kyokushin karate is characterized by requiring of its participants, strenuous training, conditioning and realistic contact while sparring. Kyokushin karate-ka believe that this contact is necessary in order to fully appreciate the resiliency of the human body and spirit and to prepare for any serious confrontation. The word ĎOSUí and the phrase ďosu no seidinĒ (perseverance under pressure) succinctly summarize the essence of the Dojo Kun, written by Sosai Mas Oyama and Eiji Yoshikawa.

"Preparing mentally, the most important thing is, if you aren't doing it for the love of it, then don't do it." - Benny Urquidez